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January 2019

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

It’s All About the Wall By Roger Kimball

By on January 20th, 2019

https://amgreatness.com/2019/01/19

Bismarck said that politics is the art of the possible. It looks like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), and other Democrats regard politics as the art of intransigence.

In his brief remarks Saturday on border security, Donald Trump outlined a plan that made multiple concessions to Democratic desiderata in exchange for $5.7 billion to fund 230 miles of the wall along the southern U.S. border. Indeed, the president’s plan deliberately took cues from some Durbin’s own legislation on the subject.

Didn’t matter. Pelosi said the president’s plan was “a non-starter.”

Before rehearsing the specifics of the plan, let’s note two things. First, as the president himself noted, his plan is meant as the first step in addressing a national crisis. The crisis has two parts. One is humanitarian. The hordes pooling at the U.S.-Mexico border attempting to gain unlawful entry to the country are taking huge risks. According to the president, one-third of the women making the journey North are subject to sexual assault; some observers put the figure even higher; some mothers, Trump said, provided their girls with contraceptives in preparation for the journey. Many of the children, most often brought along by adults, are also frequently subject to abuse. Some of those banging on our southern gates are hapless people just seeking a better life; but many are hardened criminals or aspiring terrorists.

The second part of the crisis concerns national security. The southern border is a huge conduit for dangerous drugs and dangerous thugs. Moreover, the sheer number of Hispanics seeking entry to the United States has already affected the demographic profile and character of large parts of the Southwest. This is a subject that was eloquently anatomized by Victor Davis Hanson in Mexifornia: A State of Becoming. That was several years ago and the situation has only gotten worse in the intervening years.

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POLITICS Comments turned off

Jew-Hatred in the Democratic Party By Eileen F. Toplansky

By on January 20th, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/01/jewhatred_in_the_democratic_party.html

It is really time for the liberal American Jewish Democrat to acknowledge that blatant anti-Semitism has infected the Democratic Party.

Nancy Pelosi has appointed Ilhan Omar to the House Foreign Relations Committee. Omar is viciously anti-Israel and is in favor of the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement. Omar has long been a harsh critic of Israel. In fact, in 2012 – just “a few days after Gaza-based Hamas terrorists had launched more than 150 deadly rockets into the Jewish state, prompting an Israeli military response – she tweeted that ‘the apartheid Israeli regime’ had ‘hypnotized the world’ in order to conceal its own ‘evil doings.'”

In fact, the only apartheid in the Middle East comes from Arab countries and is clearly documented by Muslim reporter Khaled Abu Toameh, who regularly highlights the Arab apartheid against Palestinians.

Furthermore, “in 2016, Omar stated that she was in favor of completely divesting the University of Minnesota of its Israel bonds. The following year, she opposed a bill designed to counter economic boycotts targeting the Jewish state.” In addition, “in 2018, Omar ran for the U.S. House of Representatives seat formerly held by Keith Ellison. Her campaign was supported by … the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which held three fundraising events on Omar’s behalf[.]”

Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy asserts that “the Democratic Party is increasingly anti-Israel and flirts, to be charitable, with anti-Semitism. Today we see the latest evidence of the character of what Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez calls the ‘New party.'”

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Understanding Brexit in 2019 By Alex Alexiev

By on January 20th, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/01/understanding_brexit_in_2019.html

To understand what’s going on in the U.K. after the defeat of Theresa May in the Commons, one needs some background not only on what motivated the Brits to vote to leave the European Union, but more importantly what it is about the E.U. that they particularly dislike.

The first part of it is easy. The English, and it was they who provided the bulk of the “leave” votes, were simply tired of being told what to do by a European Commission that had not been elected by them or anybody else, for that matter. It was a simple matter of sovereignty, especially after the European Commission turned out to be nothing more than a proxy for a new German diktat after Merkel, without consulting anyone, opened the borders of the E.U. to two million Muslim migrants in 2015.

This may have been the proximate cause of the Brexit outcome, but the deeper reasons involve long held fundamental grievances that had been simmering over many years and finally boiled over. That had to do with the direction in which the E.U. is taking Europe. To put it simply, that direction is an unmistakably left-wing course aiming at the creation of a new union of European nations that lack individual sovereignty and are told what to do by their betters – a kind of democratic Soviet Union, which history tells us is not possible.

To be sure, there are many in the U.K. who share these objectives, from the increasingly socialistic left under Jeremy Corbyn to Scottish nationalists and a rabidly pro-E.U. mainstream press, but they are still a minority and likely to remain so for the foreseeable future.

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MEDIA Comments turned off

SHARIA AND CENSORSHIP: EDWARD CLINE

By on January 20th, 2019

https://edwardcline.blogspot.com/2019/01/sharia-and-censorship.html

It is virtual common knowledge that the tech giants – Google, Facebook, Twitter, and a few other, smaller “free expression” Internet platforms, such as Patreon – are engaged in a concerted, partnered campaign to erase “hate speech” from the public discussion of speech. That is, they disagree with what is said about certain individuals, issues, or entities, and wish people to remain ignorant of what others may say or that opposition may exist to what the MSM may say. Especially taboo is any criticism of Islam, whether it’s a scholarly essay or expressing a fear of Islam (“Islamophobia”).

The censorship amounts to compliance with Islamic Sharia law.That these tech giants are in cahoots with Muslims who want to impose speech-quashing Sharia law should be no surprise to readers. Robert Spencer has published an article on Jihad Watch and Front Page about the cozy relationship between Facebook, Twitter, and CAIR (the Council on American-Islamic Relations).

Now it is becoming clear why Facebook and Twitter have for so long been harassing, shadowbanning, and blocking foes of jihad terror and Sharia oppression. Journalist Jordan Schachtel revealed in Conservative Review Tuesday that “the Hamas-tiedCouncil on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), which is best known as an unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terrorism financing case in U.S. history, appears to have access to high-ranking Facebook and Twitter executives and has communicated with these individuals about who should be allowed to stay on their platforms.”

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BOOKS, POLITICS Comments turned off

How Jared Kushner Tried to Stop Me From Running the Trump Transition By Chris Christie….see note

By on January 20th, 2019

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/01/18/jared-kushner-chris-christie-donald-trump-president-transition-book-224025

Chris Christie is the former governor of New Jersey and author of Let Me Finish: Trump, the Kushners, Bannon, New Jersey, and the Power of In-Your-Face Politics, from which this article is adapted.

To be filed under “who cares?”….the governor disgraced himself on several occasions- especially after hurricane Sandy when he gave candidate Obama prime media time; when he appointed Sohail Mohammed a known supporter of radical Islamists to the Superior court in New Jersey….rsk

On the morning of May 6, 2016, in the heat of the presidential campaign, I headed into the city to see Donald Trump. A couple weeks earlier, he had asked me to lead his government transition team, and I was ready to button down the announcement details and dive into this important responsibility. No one had to tell me how huge a job it was. But I was all in.

By this point in the presidential campaign, I’d become a semi-permanent fixture on the 26th floor of Trump Tower. The Secret Service agents didn’t bother me anymore. I didn’t have to check in with Donald’s executive assistant, Rhona Graff, or anyone else. On this particular morning, I walked past the receptionist —“Hello.” I nodded good morning to everyone, and I breezed into the main office.

“Hi, Chris. What’s up today?” Donald said without looking up as I dropped into one of the chairs in front of his desk.

“I’m doing the transition stuff,” I said.

“Oh, come on,” he said with a sigh, finally glancing up at me and scrunching his face a little. “I hate that stuff. It’s bad karma, Chris. You know that.”

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MEDIA Comments turned off

Imaginary impeachment by Matthew Knott

By on January 19th, 2019

https://quadrant.org.au/

There’s a newsroom term, “re-topping”, which means changing the first few paragraphs to include the latest facts and, as inky sorts say, “advance the story.” Yesterday’s big yarn, just now being re-topped all over the world, was a beaut: according to Buzzfeed, the outlet which first aired the confected Trump-Russiagate dossier compiled by a Washington lobbying outfit paid by Hillary’s Clinton’s presidential campaign, “two sources” had confirmed that Donald Trump instructed former attorney Michael Cohen to lie under oath. This information was said to be in special counsel Mueller’s hands and would likely lead to the president’s impeachment.

If you are inclined to believe Mr Trump is the spawn of Satan and takes his riding instructions directly from the Kremlin, it was a bombshell. At the ABC, where there are no conservatives nor, apparently, experienced senior editors to restrain the leftist gusto of a groupthink newsroom, it became the day’s big story.

The same confirmation bias was also evident at the former Fairfax comics, now part of Nine, where early on Saturday afternoon the headline and blurb reproduced atop this post continued to preside over the home page.

Trouble is, the story wasn’t true and the source denying it was no less that Mueller himself, which suggests the Buzzfeed report was very, very wrong indeed. Throughout the so-called Russiagate investigation, Team Mueller has maintained a near-monastic silence on the progress or otherwise of its diggings and delvings. That it broke that silence to refute Buzzfeed’s bogus scoop is an indictment in itself.

How did the ABC and Fairfax react to the denial of the story they loved so much, a denial which first hit the wires in the wee hours of Saturday morning?

At the ABC, the initial report was re-topped, eventually, with word of Mueller’s disavowal. After that, the original story, with its references to “bombshells”, quotes from foaming Trump critics and charting of what readers were led to believe was the path to near-certain impeachment, well that was allowed to stand. It is almost as if some news-editing backbencher decided the old and wrong story was just too good to take down and spike, which is what should happen to reports that simply aren’t true. Unless there is an outbreak of old-fashioned journalistic rigour at the ABC, that bizarre re-topped blend of opening paragraphs denying everything follows, and at great length, can still be read here.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

Brief Reflection of Federalist Papers 9 & 10 by Cole Levine see note please

By on January 19th, 2019

https://collegeconservativesoapbox.wordpress.com/2018/12/21/notes-on-

Cole Levine is a sophomore studying politics at Hillsdale College. He also writes for The College Fix: https://www.thecollegefix.com/author/cole-levine-hillsdale-college/

Hamilton:

A “firm union,” one that balances power between a federal government and states represented in a Senate, is necessary to prevent the grievous damages caused by “domestic faction and insurrection,” while also protecting the ability of states to self-govern. The “petty republics” of history, or those that had a democratic nature and lacked unified authority, constantly underwent chaotic revolutions, as their societies shifted “between the extremes of tyranny and anarchy.” They failed to protect their citizenries from foreign invasions, since their militaries swore allegiance to rivaling confederacies within the nation-states, seldom forming alliances at the outbreak of war. Thus, Hamilton rejected the positions of the anti-Federalists, or those who opposed the Constitution’s establishment of a strong federal government in favor of a republic dominated by confederacies.

The anti-Federalists misinterpreted Montesquieu’s advocation of a “small extent for republics,” by assuming he advocated for a nation-state divided by independent confederacies. The profound Liberal philosopher, although not an especially important champion of federalist republics, argued for “dimensions far short of the limits of almost every one of these [American] states,” thus taken literally and applied to the American states, would lead Americans to “take refuge at once in the arms of monarchy, or of split ourselves into an infinity of little, jealous, clashing, tumultuous commonwealths…” While Montesquieu advocated for confederacies, he pointed out the necessity for a union wherein, “several smaller states agree to become members of a larger one, which they intend to form…” He argued this sort of republic would prevent “internal corruptions” yet enjoy “all the advantages of large monarchies,” as this union would exercise strong authority while also balancing powers and protecting liberty. Thus, the anti-Federalists lacked legitimate claims of adherence to Montesquieu’s philosophies. Most of the other ideas he championed required recognition and protection from a union.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

Medical schools: The next front in the transgender wars Daniel Payne

By on January 19th, 2019

https://www.thecollegefix.com/medical-schools-

Harvard Medical is Ground Zero

Those of us who are concerned about the rise and spread of transgender ideology should be very alarmed by the news coming out of Harvard University: There, activists and benefactors are gearing up to rewrite the medical school’s curriculum in order to reflect the prevailing progressive belief about gender ideology. The proposed revisions seek to eliminate “assumptions or errors about sex and gender,” such as “conflating sexual orientation with gender identity, presuming gender is immutable or treating heterosexuality as a default.”

Well. A generation of doctors assuming that “gender” (they mean “sex”) isn’t immutable is something rather terrifying to contemplate. A doctor who believes that a man can be or become a woman, or a woman a man, does not exactly inspire a vote of medical confidence; the distinction between the two sexes is one of the obvious bright lines in the medical literature, it has been for millennia, and no amount of wishing will be able to change it. As for the idea that heterosexuality is not a “default:” Consistent polls indicate that upwards of 97% of individuals are heterosexual, possibly more. If that’s not a “default,” what is?

Working to make a medical program more comprehensive and inclusive is a good thing. Working to make it into a bizarre social experiment based on incoherent ideology is a very bad thing. This is the next front in the transgender wars: Having successfully convinced much of the culture of the merits of gender ideology, activists will now attempt to redesign the very foundations of modern medicine to reflect it. This should be deeply concerning to anyone who cares about facts, truth and good medicine, all of which are threatened by such efforts.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Debunking BuzzFeed and the Wages of Investigative Secrecy By Andrew C. McCarthy

By on January 19th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/01/buzzfeed-report-michael-cohen-mueller-investigation-secrecy/

It is long past time that the public was told exactly what the president is alleged to have done.

BuzzFeed published an explosive allegation that the president of the United States ordered his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, to lie to congressional committees investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. Specifically, in a news story sourced to two anonymous law-enforcement officials said to be “involved in an investigation of the matter,” the site reported that Special Counsel Robert Mueller had learned, though multiple witnesses and documents, of President Trump’s alleged instruction to Cohen; subsequently, upon being confronted by prosecutors, Cohen had supposedly admitted that Trump gave the order.

As a rule, Mueller does not comment on press reports about his probe. Yet, in a highly unusual move Friday night, the prosecutor refuted the story by reporters Jason Leopold and Anthony Cormier. Through a spokesman, Mueller asserted:

BuzzFeed’s description of specific statements to the special counsel’s office, and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office, regarding Michael Cohen’s congressional testimony are not accurate.

Clearly, Mueller did the right thing. The reporting had triggered a frenzy of commentary by Trump critics that impeachment was imminent, and even many chagrined Trump supporters conceded that, if the report was true, the presidency was in grave peril. Had Mueller stood idly by, the administration, and thus the governance of the nation, would have been engulfed in a ruinous storm of suspicion. It is not the special counsel’s job to correct bad reporting, but it would have been irresponsible to stay mum in these circumstances if the story was false.

Nevertheless, this incident highlights how investigative secrecy has wrongly been given pride of place. In the Mueller probe, the desire of prosecutors to go about their business in stealth — to attempt to build a case on undisclosed crimes based on unknown evidence; to prevent witnesses from gaming their testimony and evidence from being tampered with — has been prioritized over the president’s ability to govern the country.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Alan Dershowitz: BuzzFeed report (and Mueller rebuke) a vivid example of “Get Trump” media mindset

By on January 19th, 2019

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/alan-dershowitz-buzzfeed-report-and-mueller-rebuke-a-vivid-example-of-get-trump-medias-mindset

As soon as I read the explosive BuzzFeed News report alleging there was evidence that President Trump had directed his former attorney Michael Cohen to lie to Congress, I was very suspicious.

Even before the Office of Special Counsel Robert Mueller issued a statement Friday night saying that the BuzzFeed account was “not accurate,” I wrote an op-ed for the New York Daily News raising questions about whether there was actually credible evidence that Trump suborned perjury or obstructed justice by telling Cohen to lie to lawmakers.

It seemed obvious that there were no smoking gun emails containing any such direction from the president. Nor would there be eyewitnesses to any such alleged conversation.

Unlike the obstruction of justice case that led to articles of impeachment being drafted against President Nixon and his resignation – where tape recordings proved criminal conduct by Nixon – the accusations against President Trump would have to rely on the credibility of Cohen, who has a long history of lying and little if any credibility.

In fact, Cohen was sentenced in federal court in December to three years in prison after pleading guilty to lying to Congress, campaign finance violations and financial crimes.

President Trump’s spokeswoman and his lawyers strongly disputed the BuzzFeed report, which was published Thursday, even before the statement from Mueller’s spokesman knocking down the story.

“Two words sum it up better than anything anybody else can say, and that is ‘categorically false,’” White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Friday.

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